Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Exit Podcast, this is Dr. Bennett.
Speaker: Trying something a little different this week.
Speaker: We are bringing in some callers for a, I don't know if I can say car talk on the air, but a Q&A type of conversation with some entrepreneurs.
Speaker: to give a taste of what we do on the entrepreneurship call and talk through some problems that folks are having or idea generation, some brainstorming that we do together on people's small businesses or small business ideas.
Speaker: So today we've got myself, David Moore, Josh Tobler, and Kyle Albert to talk through what's going on with their situation and their experience with Exit so far.
Speaker: And yeah, let's go ahead and get started with David.
Speaker: Do you want to give us an introduction?
Speaker: Yeah, I've been on the podcast before, but good to be back.
Speaker: I've really enjoyed being in Exit, been helping to facilitate the entrepreneurship call that we have every week.
Speaker: And you and I have talked quite a bit just about helping entrepreneurs and really enjoying generating ideas, generating solutions, addressing the unique challenges and conundrums that come up with entrepreneurs in various stages of their growth.
Speaker: And this was just something that we've both, I think, wanted to try and excited to give folks a taste of what goes on inside of Exit on an entrepreneurship call, but also to listen for their own value today, to hear what we might generate on behalf of these gentlemen, and perhaps they can discover some ideas for their own businesses as well.
Speaker: And then a little bit about your own entrepreneurial experience and background.
Speaker: Yeah, so I had a specialty pharmacy business for a number of years.
Speaker: I sold that in 2017.
Speaker: I've been involved in various entrepreneurship groups, several startups, and I
Speaker: led an accelerator, business accelerator group here in St.
Speaker: Louis, Missouri for a number of years.
Speaker: And I've just always loved working with entrepreneurs in various phases.
Speaker: And so it's kind of a passion of mine.
Speaker: People have commented that I've over-consumed business material, but it's just a domain in which I love to spend time.
Speaker: So this is just a natural, it feels like a natural extension of that.
Speaker: Right on, thanks.
Speaker: So I think we'll start with Kyle.
Speaker: And let's talk a little bit about your background and what you do for a living and maybe what you're up against.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, thanks for inviting me on the show.
Speaker: And yeah, I've actually been a part of Exit Now for, gosh, I don't know.
Speaker: It's probably been...
Speaker: five or six months, something like that.
Speaker: And so far, it's been a great experience.
Speaker: And it's been fun getting a chance to meet some of the other fellows who are maybe, you know, we're all coming from different places, but sometimes there's some interesting overlap in some of the struggles that we're dealing with.
Speaker: yeah i i'm a software developer and it manager sort of by trade i've been doing that for like 20 something years now and um have had a have had a side business for about 10 years now um and started out as a app development um idea and company and i still have some some mobile apps in fact i'm i'm working on a new one now but um
Speaker: I started to branch out into other things, primarily web development for small businesses and nonprofit organizations.
Speaker: And so that has actually been going fairly well.
Speaker: I mean, I make a decent little side income from that.
Speaker: But yeah, I've been struggling with...
Speaker: What I'd like to do eventually is get to the point where I could just leave my day job working for my corporate overlord and strike out totally on my own.
Speaker: But I guess what I'll say is that the big challenge I've run up against is...
Speaker: Where I've had the most success in this side hustle is really working with people, basically doing the consulting thing where I sell my time to companies to help advise them and help them with their website.
Speaker: And at some point, you just run up against the fact that you just only have so many hours in the day, especially when you have a nine to five day job.
Speaker: So I feel like I can't push it far enough to get to the point where it's got enough income that I could leave my day job without leaving my day job.
Speaker: So it's sort of a chicken and egg situation.
Speaker: I mean, your hourly rate.
Speaker: I mean, one way to kind of, quote unquote, scale a consulting business is just to increase your hourly rate.
Speaker: And is there a skill set that, I mean, are you doing something that's just like easy enough to find that you feel like you couldn't charge more?
Speaker: Or have you tried charging more?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I actually, well, I will say this.
Speaker: I think one of the biggest problems I've got is I'm starting from a point where it's going to be awfully hard to replace my day job income.
Speaker: I'm paid pretty well.
Speaker: It was a few years ago, I finally sort of got the old saying about golden handcuffs.
Speaker: I kind of finally realized what that was about because
Speaker: I'm paid pretty well in my day job.
Speaker: And so as a result, you know, I mean, my wife and I are actually pretty frugal, but, uh, but at the same time, you know, we've got two kids in Catholic school.
Speaker: One of them is about to go off to college.
Speaker: So, I mean, there are a certain level of expenses and, um, and we have a certain amount of income that we kind of plan on having every month.
Speaker: So, um,
Speaker: But yeah, to answer your question, I mean, I actually do charge a fairly high rate, I think.
Speaker: It's not like I'm... That's one of the things I think I have done a pretty good job at.
Speaker: I mean, I'm not one of these people who grossly undervalues their...
Speaker: their skillset.
Speaker: Um, so I feel like I charge pretty well.
Speaker: Um, but, um, it's one of those things where, uh, I, I feel like, and, and I guess this is kind of, you know, ties in with, with what Tobes was just saying, you know, one of his issues too is, you know, going out and finding, um,
Speaker: finding that business, finding those additional clients.
Speaker: I've managed to take one, I have one particular client that I really managed to leverage up pretty well.
Speaker: They've kind of expanded what they've needed from me over the last, I've had them now with me for three years.
Speaker: But yeah, so I think part of it is just finding a few additional clients like that.
Speaker: I mean, if I had a couple more like that, I probably could
Speaker: could make the jump.
Speaker: But the way I keep trying to leverage my way out of this is I keep thinking, well, if I could just get...
Speaker: gets a couple products off the ground that are more of a, you know, don't require my direct involvement in terms of time to generate revenue.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So I've, I, uh, coached my son in flag football for many years.
Speaker: So I wrote an ebook on, on, uh, it's like a guide for coaching flag football for new, new dads who are finding themselves in that role because that's where I was.
Speaker: I had no idea.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: how to do any of that.
Speaker: And over several years, we ended up becoming like a powerhouse flag football team.
Speaker: And so I tried to take all that experience and I do okay with that.
Speaker: I make a couple hundred bucks a month off of that, but that's not enough to really move the needle significantly.
Speaker: And like I said, I've tried apps.
Speaker: So I think part of the issue is too, that I'm a little bit too scattered.
Speaker: I'm not focused on one thing.
Speaker: I keep trying multiple different things.
Speaker: I've actually, like I said, I've got an idea for a new app.
Speaker: I've got an idea for a new website and I'm building both of those right now.
Speaker: And I actually did have a client that I was doing pretty well with in terms of software consulting.
Speaker: And I actually had to kind of tell them I needed to ramp down a little bit only because I
Speaker: I had another, I have a good, very good friend of mine who's pulled me into a startup that he's getting off the ground and I'm going to be doing their website.
Speaker: It's going to be an e-commerce website.
Speaker: And that's one of those things where they're not going to be paying me directly for my time.
Speaker: It's more like I'll be getting a share of the revenues off of that particular product once it starts to sell.
Speaker: But unfortunately, we're not at the point where we're actually selling yet.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: I've got a lot of different irons in the fire and that's probably part of the issue is that I'm not focused, right?
Speaker: I can already, I just know that's one of the things you guys are probably going to say is, hey man, you're trying, you're, you're, you've only got a limited amount of time outside of your day job and you're diluting it amongst like four different things.
Speaker: So why don't you try to, you know, focus on one thing?
Speaker: That wouldn't be my first pass.
Speaker: I mean, it would depend on whether you found the thing that you love.
Speaker: I mean, the thing that really animates you.
Speaker: And if the answer is yes, then yes, focus is maybe an issue.
Speaker: But if not, then it may be even important to explore more broadly.
Speaker: Let me ask you this.
Speaker: If your consulting business was 40 hours a week at your present rate,
Speaker: would that compensate you for the loss of the day job?
Speaker: Yeah, it would.
Speaker: It would.
Speaker: And that's, I know that, so one of the big advantages we have right now, my wife actually switched her employee job to a consulting job a few years back.
Speaker: But one of the reasons we were able to do that was I still carry all the benefits, right?
Speaker: So we don't have to worry about trying to pay for health insurance for the family ourselves necessarily, although, you know, we have to pay for part of it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But yeah, even with that, I think it would probably cover it.
Speaker: The problem is, as you guys know, you can't necessarily do 40 hours solid a week of consulting, billable consulting, because part of that time has to be spent on kind of administrative tasks, but also maybe working on the pipeline of new clients to take over where you've got some other clients that may be dropping off or maybe the level of work is going to go down.
Speaker: Yeah, and you indicated that one of the things I think that you're seeking is seeking leverage because even the e-book idea, the idea of that is to create money passively.
Speaker: So it seems one of the benefits of employment is that we get paid in between times when we're not actively working and the money flows even while you're on break, so to speak.
Speaker: And it sounds like what would be required to make the side...
Speaker: gig, a full-time thing is where you had a similar type of leverage where you're actually managing a team and you are responsible for a portion of that time drumming up the business or developing the relationships that serve as feeders, referral feeders to your business.
Speaker: You know how to earn more money in more hours.
Speaker: That's a skill set you've developed clearly.
Speaker: And now it's about getting...
Speaker: It's about getting the relationships in place to perhaps provide you with a flow of business that could be farmed out to a team.
Speaker: Is that fair to say?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, I've definitely thought about that track or as I said, like maybe it's a mix of some, I have a couple of products, like a couple of websites and a couple of info products that are selling kind of passively almost.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And then I've also got the consulting stuff and maybe the,
Speaker: the combined revenue stream from those two things, you know, covers, covers all of it.
Speaker: So, um, yeah, I, that's, that's the issue is, and I think part of it, getting back to what you were saying, Kevin is like,
Speaker: there is a little bit of aspect of my side company is my outlet for trying new things.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And I have a little bit of that ADHD brain where I'm constantly sort of like, Oh, this would be cool if I, uh, if I did this and then I get excited about something and I try it out and you know, that's good and bad.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So, yeah, I mean, I I'll say this about, about my experience with exit.
Speaker: I do, I get the ADHD.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: but I'm finding that I really picked something that touches all of my obsessions.
Speaker: And so I get the ADHD, but it all seems to come back around to this central goal.
Speaker: It's reinforcing rather than diffusing my effort.
Speaker: It also means that I stay fresh, you know, because I'm not, if I was literally just executing the initial plan for exit,
Speaker: I would be really bored right now.
Speaker: It's the fact that we've found these other avenues and these other angles that strengthen that initial offering.
Speaker: That's what makes it fun.
Speaker: So I think you don't necessarily need to think of that as like something to gut through, right?
Speaker: I think it may just mean that you got to find where you're deep, where your soul is on some of this stuff, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What I hear you saying, Kevin, is that it's not so much that you barrel down on one task harder.
Speaker: It's that you're actually executing on a series of ideas that seem symbiotic.
Speaker: And that if you have a set of conversations and you're developing relationships that seem like they would provide the type of work that you would bring in-house into a
Speaker: to your own company, but that you're also exploring at these tangential and fringe ideas that seem like they would also be in service of this larger goal.
Speaker: And what I've seen Kevin do with Exit is to have kind of a plethora of projects that are taking place that all have a potential to create either revenue streams, new clients, or greater transaction size
Speaker: from each each member and future members in ways that the offering grows as the offering is sort of tapped upon by its internal members.
Speaker: And it doesn't it doesn't become unsustainable as far as mind share, because having that many things on my plate.
Speaker: I'm able to talk, I talk to my brain trust, basically, and I say,
Speaker: three of these things have lost my interest and here's why.
Speaker: And generally it's because they weren't that great of an idea or I'm not the right guy to do it.
Speaker: And I think like, for instance, this ebook thing, like our guys, our guys vary in how far afield they want to go from their day job.
Speaker: And if you find that like, you really like the actual blocking and tackling of, of the development job that you do,
Speaker: you just would rather it was oriented toward maybe a cause that was more important to you or something like that.
Speaker: If that rings true, I mean, you're nodding your head, then maybe it's the ebook, but it's not about flag football.
Speaker: It's about some element of this development job that you're an expert in or some piece of that makes it a business card for the other thing that you're doing so that everything...
Speaker: feeds everything else.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What you guys are saying is, is resonating a lot.
Speaker: I think that's, it makes a lot of sense.
Speaker: And I think that's, that's definitely an area where I probably need to try to figure out how to get better at, um,
Speaker: making these different efforts tied together in some way so that it is, there is a symbiosis there.
Speaker: There is a synergy there between all the different efforts so that if I'm establishing relationships, for example, that they're not completely disconnected areas of the world, right?
Speaker: They could potentially be leading down the same general direction.
Speaker: Now a guy who finds himself doing that
Speaker: I want to ask that guy, are you trying to get away from what you do for a living?
Speaker: So it's a question of like, is it something that you're doing accidentally on purpose?
Speaker: Or is it something where you really could just vote?
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: So where, yeah, where are you at on that?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, so, well, there's a lot about my day job that I actually like.
Speaker: It's just that, A, I work for a government contractor, right?
Speaker: So doing that work for the federal government kind of makes me feel very gross and not super...
Speaker: I don't feel great about myself and I also just don't feel, uh, you know, super proud of that.
Speaker: So, um, you know, it's not necessarily, uh, the, it's not the people I work with and it's not the kind of work I'm doing, um, necessarily.
Speaker: So, uh,
Speaker: you know, my faith is super important to me, and one of the things I've tried to do—I keep trying to sort of—and again, the flag football thing is totally unrelated to that—but I've tried to keep bringing things into an umbrella of sort of serving that, you know, my Catholic faith, or even just broadly Christian,
Speaker: So, you know, if I could do the problem with that is that like a lot of my expertise would be, um, maybe like helping people create and bring to market products, but there's not a lot of Christian organizations doing that.
Speaker: I mean, there are, obviously you could use those same skills to bring, um, maybe educational or faith-based kinds of products to market, but,
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: There's just not a whole lot about that.
Speaker: Well, I actually think, and David and I have discussed this in the past, that there are so many people who through COVID had to discover the homeschooling ecosystem.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And I will be, including us, I mean, partly that was just because we aged into it right around that time, as far as our little girl got that old.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But also, we took a look around and like the best option that we could find was, first of all, it works great for my girl.
Speaker: It's not going to work great for my boys.
Speaker: It's very girly.
Speaker: And I think a lot of homeschool curriculum skews that way.
Speaker: And second, it's like incorporating faith in like this very like...
Speaker: square peg in a round hole kind of way where it's like, we're going to talk about physics and it's, well, God made it that way.
Speaker: And there's not really like, you know, like not to say they don't like teach the principles cause they do.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But like, they're just sort of inserting God to insert God.
Speaker: Like they're not thinking very carefully about it.
Speaker: And that was, as far as I know, that's like one of the top ones that there is.
Speaker: So like, I, I really think that there's a huge,
Speaker: market for that.
Speaker: And we've actually talked about, you know, potentially developing something in that space.
Speaker: Yeah, I think that actually gets that
Speaker: That mention of the homeschool market, I think that gets to this idea of symbiotic pools.
Speaker: So exit is a great kind of central place to begin your networking and your refinement of your offerings and developing ideas and testing them out in kind of a laboratory.
Speaker: I think it's also very valuable to inject yourself into a
Speaker: areas that may be symbiotic to your Catholic faith that are maybe, you know, maybe it's the homeschool, maybe it's the after school sports, maybe it's under, I went to just recently to a homeschool convention, because I want to work in more wholesome, you know, kind of clean and purposeful industries that the homeschool industry was one that I felt would be one, at least to kind of walk the trade show floor.
Speaker: And I saw a lot of opportunities that existed.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: One, I think to maybe think of some like-minded adjacent groups in addition to exit or even whether or not they're membership groups, but they're just, you attend an event where you get to see the landscape of opportunity and talk about what it is you do.
Speaker: And thereby you meet people that are
Speaker: Maybe in thinking creatively for themselves and their own families, or they're thinking on behalf of their own homeschool businesses, or there's additional offerings that could be added to, you know, whatever the homeschool company or any other adjacent space.
Speaker: I liked when Kevin and I have talked about other things.
Speaker: other places we can be that would serve and nourish the groups that we're already in or places that we could visit or people that we could talk to that where we start to see a real blood flow of ideas.
Speaker: And especially as it relates to guys who have existing
Speaker: side businesses in place that need to be, um, maybe have a more robust pipeline of clientele or even a collaborative clientele.
Speaker: Um, I think that would be one domain in which just to take a look around.
Speaker: And, you know, a good, a good framework maybe for this, because like you say, you've got so many ideas in your head and you're excited about several of them.
Speaker: Um, and,
Speaker: to the extent you can tell ahead of time what is going to be synergistic and what is not, I don't know.
Speaker: But worst case scenario, maybe you just think about it in terms of phases.
Speaker: Like what is the easiest thing to start?
Speaker: And you've already done that because you have started.
Speaker: And then what is the easiest thing to scale?
Speaker: What is the easiest thing to add?
Speaker: And that by itself may solve the scaling problem.
Speaker: And if not, it will at least help refine the question.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think trade show attendance is, is an, um, very underrated modality for sparking the mind and just getting into the, the, the myriad of ways in which people practice their, um,
Speaker: faith or their lifestyle.
Speaker: I mean, I was shocked at the offerings, the sheer number of offerings that were available at the homeschool trade show.
Speaker: But yeah, I mean, there's so many ways in which homeschooling was being deployed and delivered and in the ways that families were piecing together various offerings that I think there would be a lot of raw material to draw from.
Speaker: There is also, at least in my experience, a little bit of an allergy to tech.
Speaker: And I'll tell you, so partly that's like maybe an ideological orientation that you're not going to change.
Speaker: I think it's also that just the available offerings are not great.
Speaker: Or if there are great offerings, I'm not aware of them.
Speaker: I've looked here and there.
Speaker: And so I see that as kind of a rich frontier, a place where the right offering could really make money.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And just a lack and just a lack of men in the space as well.
Speaker: I mean, I can tell you that just walking the hall, it was primarily female attended.
Speaker: And I think that
Speaker: presents another great opportunity for a male influence to enter into that domain more prominently or at least as an ideation hub.
Speaker: Different.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: There's no doubt that like right now we are, it's just, there's an embarrassment of riches of opportunities for, I think, folks like us.
Speaker: I mean, between...
Speaker: between the homeschooling explosion because of driven largely by COVID, but also, you know, by the, some of the insanity going on in the public schools.
Speaker: Um, but, but also just the, um, the sudden desire across America for, um, kind of conservative alternatives to mainstream products, right?
Speaker: Like there,
Speaker: Basically at this point, just imagine a successful mainstream product and then just create a conservative version of that, right?
Speaker: Or sort of like traditional family values version of that.
Speaker: And boom, you've got a product.
Speaker: I'm not going to try to take away... I'm not going to try to take food out of your children's mouth over a bad tweet version of it.
Speaker: Yeah, right.
Speaker: It's also a real...
Speaker: there's an enormous amount of talent.
Speaker: And I think it's great to be on a podcast talking about your desire to
Speaker: to create something because it's there's there will be guys listening who are, you know, in a space where maybe they have more time freedom and less visibility as far as in terms of where they where they spend their day and how they're the you know, the layout of their day is less visible to their employer so that they can take on additional projects.
Speaker: So there's been this enormous disruption and such an enormous taste of work from home that most people
Speaker: would have gone a whole lifetime without ever really experiencing.
Speaker: But now that folks have tasted it, they're looking to piecemeal together their careers in a way that, you know, just by virtue of talking about your desire, I think you will get individuals who maybe aren't able to join you full time, but could, but are also looking to be side hustle employed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I think ultimately it comes down to, there's tons of opportunities.
Speaker: So it's a matter of trying to figure out what's the, it doesn't necessarily have to be one thing, but what's the unifying umbrella that I want to try to bring these things under?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, and yeah, we talked a lot about homeschool, but there's tons of other avenues you could pursue.
Speaker: And I would say if I could give you homework, it would be budget for time and money and sacrifice.
Speaker: Basically like,
Speaker: I recognize that you have expenses, you have a lifestyle, you have a mortgage, etc.
Speaker: But defining, I think, in concrete terms, what this is worth to you, what it would be worth to you to get out, that may not mean cutting lifestyle, it may mean
Speaker: uh, dedicating more of your time and being busier for a while while you build something, but just like, what am I willing to pay to achieve this?
Speaker: And that, I think that question is largely going to be defined by what is the compelling vision that drives this?
Speaker: If it's just like, you know, I feel underutilized or I'm not excited about being a defense contractor, there's a certain level of commitment that you'll give to that.
Speaker: But once it's not just a stick, once there's a carrot, an impelling force in front of you, that's like, that's what I believe in.
Speaker: I think that's what really will create the desire to carve out the time and eventually burn the ships.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, I appreciate the homework and I'm always up for homework.
Speaker: But yeah, I think you're right.
Speaker: I think I'm getting to that point where it isn't just going to magically happen on its own.
Speaker: I have to define what are those goals look like and then start thinking about, okay, what steps do I need to be taking to start getting us down that path?
Speaker: One other idea to concretize Kevin's idea just a little bit is...
Speaker: Is it possible, and I don't know what your budget is, I don't know if you've got the margin to even pull this off, but is it possible to tighten your belt 15% and stash some money away in a runway fund so that when you're ready to make the jump and free up more of your time, you have three months, six months of runway, a little bit of wiggle room to try to get the side gig up to full gig status?
Speaker: That was a huge part of me having the confidence to move on my thing was having some runway.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'll just add one more thing to just to draw out that Venn diagram, you know, the circles around your around your faith and your in your vision.
Speaker: And think about those adjacent spaces.
Speaker: And, you know, homeschooling was one that we mentioned today.
Speaker: But think about think about the lifestyle of the type of people you want to solve problems for and be around and where they spend time.
Speaker: And then and then back when you when you've determined what those adjacent spaces are, then try to really scaffold the exposure to them with
Speaker: dates and times and places that you want to be, rooms you want to be in that maybe you haven't been in before.
Speaker: And then conversations scheduled with individuals that either represent or have a good understanding of the infrastructure of those spaces, the web presences of those spaces, and start to have dialogue with individuals that are either you meet in these new rooms where you insert yourself or
Speaker: you know, with individuals that are, that you come across through your web research and networking with friends on that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, Kyle, I really hope that we can catch up with you either in the tech or the entrepreneurship call on this project.
Speaker: I recognize it's nebulous, but your progress on deciding where you want to land and what you really want to dedicate yourself to.
Speaker: So, but great to hear from you and thanks for coming on.
Speaker: Yeah, thank you.
Speaker: All righty, Josh.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Let's, can we, can we redo your introduction?
Speaker: Can you tell us, uh, uh, can you tell us where you're at and your current situation?
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Um, so I run a search engine optimization marketing agency called long tail dragon.
Speaker: Uh, so what that means is, uh, we take small businesses and we do all of the things required to make them show up better in, uh, search results for search engines, especially Google.
Speaker: Um, and it's, it's doing pretty good.
Speaker: Uh, it's been growing steadily since I started it in 2020.
Speaker: Um, I started with like seven clients or so, and I'm up to 21.
Speaker: Uh, so, uh, that's good.
Speaker: Um, of course we're targeting small businesses.
Speaker: Uh, I like working with small businesses.
Speaker: That also means that with each incremental account that I sell, um, it's, it's not like a huge life changing, uh,
Speaker: amount of revenue.
Speaker: That combined with the inflation lately, my costs have gone up.
Speaker: And so it's like, I feel like I am always almost having a marketing budget, but never quite.
Speaker: I'm like always two more sales away from a marketing budget.
Speaker: And it never quite materializes.
Speaker: One of these days, I hope it does, because that's going to make my life a little bit easier.
Speaker: But in the meantime, I'm trying to grow this thing with elbow grease.
Speaker: I'm doing cold email.
Speaker: I'm doing cold LinkedIn.
Speaker: I am doing a little bit of SEO for myself, but even doing it for myself costs money.
Speaker: And that's money that I don't have a lot of.
Speaker: So that's a slow, but that's a long-term play.
Speaker: And part of this challenge with inflation is that if you had 10...
Speaker: If you had 10 clients who were twice the size making the same revenue, then you'd only have to have 10 renegotiations about the inflation problem, renegotiating rates versus 21.
Speaker: So that's definitely one of the reasons why bigger clients can be easier to deal with.
Speaker: But you have the advantage of... So I know someone who ran an online marketing company that had very large clients and
Speaker: One of their challenges, it's kind of like one of those things where like if you owe the bank $100,000, they own you.
Speaker: If you owe them a billion dollars, you own the bank.
Speaker: Very much they had clients whose needs were existential for the survival of the organization.
Speaker: And taking these little bites.
Speaker: Well, here's just my initial thought.
Speaker: on that, maybe how your, your approach has advantages is that with small clients, you can maybe afford to churn a little bit more and explore the clients who are the best clients.
Speaker: So like focus on your, on your top performers and maybe start firing some low performers.
Speaker: That depends of course, on bringing in, like you have to have a really good intake on that jet engine.
Speaker: But I think if you are having to raise rates in response to these systemic problems, then you almost need to be pulling in, pulling in, pulling in to make this small business model feasible.
Speaker: Does that track?
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: And it's the top of the funnel that I think isn't functioning very well.
Speaker: I can close and I can retain.
Speaker: Attracting is, I'm not as good at that.
Speaker: The first thought that comes to my mind as it relates to those who serve as your primary referral sources, which tends to be marketing firms, is that correct?
Speaker: Yeah, so two-thirds of my business is doing SEO on behalf of other
Speaker: agencies doing it under their brand as a white label arrangement, which I like doing because then they do the sales.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm having this impression that sometimes it might
Speaker: The impression I'm having is that sometimes growing larger in scope offering can actually help one to become one's own referral source.
Speaker: In other words, by offering, you know, looking at what some of the larger firms do in terms of the firms that refer to you, actually getting into some of their
Speaker: lines of business might make you feel more, that you have kind of more columns upholding your structure.
Speaker: And so if it's a business that does something that you don't do, and they tend to be a great referral source, perhaps leaning into the actual work that they do and marketing, I think SEO is seen as such a narrow and important function
Speaker: but it seems to be sometimes a line item offering.
Speaker: And so maybe developing like an additional menu or kind of going after a larger section of the entire marketing process might help to position you.
Speaker: Again, I realize this is a tall order, but it may have you be, I think it develops more of a robustness
Speaker: to your to your revenue and also allows you to market aspects of your business that are not as that are maybe a little bit more sexy than SEO.
Speaker: And I think when you can lead with more
Speaker: more of the kind of the creative branding side of the marketing business, which tends to be more relatable to the layman and the lay business person.
Speaker: That can be like the thing they're buying.
Speaker: And then SEO is just an additional thing that they're paying for.
Speaker: Because I think sometimes purchasing SEO feels sometimes can feel like purchasing something very functional in the home that is understood to be valuable.
Speaker: But I'd much rather buy a kitchen remodel than a new high-tech dishwasher.
Speaker: And so maybe widening the offering of the scope could be something that would be something to be considering.
Speaker: So that sounds exciting to me.
Speaker: Because there are things that I want to do that I haven't started doing yet.
Speaker: And maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way.
Speaker: So maybe I want to pick your brains about this a little bit.
Speaker: For example, I really want to do like an integrated content marketing service.
Speaker: Like I'm already doing blogs as part of the SEO, which is like, you know, probably a third of what would be involved.
Speaker: I already have all of the capacity I need to be generating content because I'm already doing it.
Speaker: So to do that with a slightly different KPI in mind makes a lot of sense.
Speaker: There's some synergy there.
Speaker: I've been dragging my feet on launching that because I don't know what launch means.
Speaker: Like, I don't know.
Speaker: I can throw up a new service page on my website, but that's already not attracting leads.
Speaker: So I don't...
Speaker: To me, it sounds like going through the time and effort of building out the workflow seems like it's if the problem is sales, it feels like I'm focusing on the wrong problem.
Speaker: But but but that's not but you're you're telling me that's not true.
Speaker: Well, I think I think it launched at the base, most basic level could be seen as a conversation with the client.
Speaker: I think conversations are really are micro launches in a way because you're exploring this desire to do something additional.
Speaker: And again, it may lead to even a pitch where you're actually recommending a price, but to have a trusted conversation with what you perceive to be a ready client, I think could be, could be at this stage of launch.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, it sounds like I've got some work to do then.
Speaker: I think, and it's this idea of opening another line of business with your present clientele is potentially, because I suspect that partially you are working with smaller clients because, well, you tell me, is the reason that you like working with these smaller clients because you sort of identify with the scrappy small business owner and that's who you want to serve and help?
Speaker: Is that what that's animated by?
Speaker: Or is it more about it being practically easier?
Speaker: Oh, I think it's both of those things.
Speaker: I think it's more the first thing than the second thing.
Speaker: And also what you mentioned about, I don't want to be beholden to one Goliath client who, if they quit, tank my business.
Speaker: I've seen that happen before and I'm intentionally trying to avoid that trap.
Speaker: Yeah, so I think that opening additional lines of business is a way that you make these clients bigger without making them any more powerful with respect to you.
Speaker: Um, and you're still, you're still serving the type of people that you would like to serve.
Speaker: And I totally agree.
Speaker: I mean, like, you know, just from, just from inside our little, uh, ecosystem, uh, there, there are so many guys who are looking to write.
Speaker: And so like, there's this, this ready-made pool.
Speaker: Um, and, and, and yeah, it's kind of a, every part of the Buffalo type of a situation.
Speaker: I feel like I'm the only business owner in America that is not dealing with, not struggling with a labor shortage.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I love this idea of a conversation where you say to a client, I have a unique possession of a set of talented writers, unlike anyone I've ever known in this industry.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: That this unique...
Speaker: circumstance has fallen upon me and it's it's beholden on me to to deliver this value to you because of this circumstance of my of my associations and and i've got to deploy it on your behalf um could be one way to kind of start to articulate that that opening overture well this is interesting i mean i i love the back end of building that stuff out building the workflow uh making everything
Speaker: We're automating parts of it so that it just runs like a well-oiled machine.
Speaker: I love that stuff.
Speaker: So having an excuse to do that makes me happy.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Right on.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, I think that, yeah, pitching it as, because content marketing can mean all sorts of different things.
Speaker: And so your challenge will be like, I am not talking about spam bots from Belarus doing content marketing.
Speaker: I've actually got really talented writers who, who, you know, you probably wouldn't tell them everything those guys have written, but, but talented writers, you know, and, and maybe, maybe some, some writing samples and some ideas of, of, of what,
Speaker: other people, like maybe if you've got, I mean, I'm sure you've tracked like what has got the best engagement of the things that have been written so far.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: It reminds me, you know, when a restaurant says to you, you know, we've just got these incredible morel mushrooms in and you're ordering this tonight because we've got these in and we just demand that you try this, you know, you hand over the, all the reins of control to the server and you let them drive the dinner.
Speaker: And I think you could do something maybe similar there.
Speaker: Yeah, I like that.
Speaker: I like that.
Speaker: I'm going to try messaging stuff that way from now on because that was effective.
Speaker: I don't even like mushrooms and I want to buy those mushrooms.
Speaker: Well, cool.
Speaker: So as far as homework, how do you think you can move the needle in the next week or so?
Speaker: to start that process?
Speaker: How far along are you kind of already to having that capability?
Speaker: Oh, well, so I've actually already done this on a different product line.
Speaker: So I've been through this process once.
Speaker: I'm not far enough that I can drive sales a week from today, but I can certainly go through the, I can at least figure out
Speaker: how much work there is to do to build out the, the capabilities necessary to do content marketing.
Speaker: Um, I can do that in a day probably.
Speaker: Kind of like a, uh, a job rec for that, for, for that task.
Speaker: Like what, what's involved?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, uh, like I've, I've, I've got the writers and that workflow is already functioning very, very well.
Speaker: Um, uh, what I need is to think about, um,
Speaker: lead magnets, and I need to think about mailing list management, and I need to figure out how much time this is going to take because I've got some time but not tons.
Speaker: How big of an offering as far as price point would this be relative to your existing relationship with these clients?
Speaker: Is it a 10% upcharge?
Speaker: What does it look like?
Speaker: It'd be more than that.
Speaker: To do everything, well, and it can be probably relatively customizable.
Speaker: I may be able to do it in layers.
Speaker: To do everything that I want to do in a premium version is probably significantly more than I'm currently charging.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So then that means a more aggressive pitch, right?
Speaker: It means that you're... Because if you're saying, you know, it's only a couple bucks extra a month, and that's one thing.
Speaker: But if you're saying that I'm going to 2x or I'm going to 1.5x, that's a deeper conversation.
Speaker: So the reason I want to address that is because I know that you've voiced this insecurity about pitching.
Speaker: Do you feel like that accrues to your existing clients, pitching them on something new?
Speaker: Or is it really just the cold, going in cold, talking to somebody you don't know?
Speaker: You know, I don't know that I've got an insecurity about pitching.
Speaker: I do have an insecurity about raising current prices on clients because I have a great retention rate, which is something that I've been counting on.
Speaker: And I'm hesitant to do anything that might threaten that.
Speaker: But to go back to your question about price too, that may look different.
Speaker: Bringing on a content marketing client who's not already doing SEO, that might be expensive.
Speaker: But since SEO contains some of the deliverables of a content marketing package, the pitch for an existing client, that might actually decrease the amount that I would need to upcharge them.
Speaker: So it might not be quite as aggressive as I'm thinking.
Speaker: But anyway, that's something I need to figure out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And you may even consider like a first adopter pricing strategy for one of your clients that goes first and then develop a case study around the experience.
Speaker: I'm not suggesting discounts, so to speak, but if you feel like this could be something that
Speaker: you want to have a show home or you want to have a, you know, a model home of the first of the first fully adopted, maximally utilizing client who's availing themselves of every of every service that you have.
Speaker: developing something for them so that they could be your, you know, your flagship case study.
Speaker: Um, and maybe, maybe as part of that compensation is that they, you know, agreed to provide robust testimonials and, um, allow you to, to utilize them in your marketing material as well.
Speaker: And I ought to be doing it for myself too.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And even if you build the case study around that, like, you know, uh,
Speaker: a particular company that I did this for my company, um, you know, saw X and Y and Z results from, from this, uh, content marketing strategy.
Speaker: Yeah, that's not bad.
Speaker: Well, uh, yeah.
Speaker: So I, I think, I think it's a great place to start with the, uh, the, um, the sort of taking stock of, of what it would require to, uh, to implement this new line of business.
Speaker: And, and, um, and I, I really appreciate you, uh,
Speaker: coming on and letting us poke around under the hood there.
Speaker: That was a lot of fun.
Speaker: Yeah, that is a lot of fun.
Speaker: I think I've got some more brains to pick about this too.
Speaker: Right on.
Speaker: Let us know if we can help you get in touch with anybody.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: I will do that.
Speaker: Thanks, fellas.
Speaker: It's just a great time.
Speaker: And for those of you listening, if you want to learn more about what we do at Exit, a lot of it's just like this.
Speaker: We do it on the entrepreneurship call every Thursday night, which is tonight at 9 p.m.
Speaker: Eastern.
Speaker: Check us out at exitgroup.us or follow us on Twitter at exit underscore org.
Speaker: Thanks, fellas.
